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About this project

Hundreds of people have bought my game S/Lay w/Me ("slay with me") since its release in 2010. They've learned how well it supports multiple adventures and brings the finest sword-and-sorcery spattering out from your own mind.

This isn't just fantasy role-playing - it's what I want from fantasy role-playing. - Maura, one of the early playtesters

Let's get more of you together! I want to provide the technology to play S/Lay w/Me face to face online.

You probably already know about Google Hangouts, currently the easiest method for on-line face-to-face interaction. This Kickstart funds an add-on S/Lay w/Me application for it - a flawless platform for playing the game on-line, face-to-face, that will manage turn order, dice rolls, and similar things. It's not just a dice table; I'm shooting for a genuine working medium for playing a specific game. I want S/Lay w/Me to blaze a trail for the hobby into this technology.

Start a Hangout with a friend using the prototype to see how it functions, and here's a training tool to preview first if you like. Imagine it with fully-operating features and professionally-designed visual details. The Kickstart funds will pay Jasper Flick to get it there. Once funded, the app becomes available and free to the whole world.

S/Lay w/Me app screenshot

WAIT, WHAT'S THIS GAME, ANYWAY?

It's a two-person phantasmagoric role-playing game about lovers and monsters. Here's the Game page.

For fun as we go, visit the Art & Play Gallery. You can enter information about the games you're playing, offer a fee for art, and post the illustrations that artists provide. It already works pretty well, but its format is humble. As this Kickstart continues, its functions will become automated and much easier. Help create a fabulous tapestry of S/Lay w/Me sagas and their amazing visuals!

REWARDS

Every backer receives a PDF of the original rules - perfectly functional, but not as spiffy as the revised and expanded one you can pledge for (that's the first on the list of rewards below).

This is the master list of rewards, $25 each. You pick however many of them you want, then pledge that amount (see the reward tiers). You don't have to say which, or even choose at all yet. At the end of the Kickstart, the survey will ask which ones you want!

The new S/Lay w/Me rulebook (.PDF, but if you want the physical book too, this is how)

First inclusion in an initially-closed Google Hangouts circle dedicated to the common ground between the post-Forge indie scene and the OSR (to be opened up later if members see fit)

S/Lay w/Me with me! Only available if included in $100 pledges and higher

Most of these are strictly limited to this Kickstart and will not be available afterwards (exceptions = the first two).

Risks and challenges

This Kickstart is for a specific skilled, freelance task: web-app and website design. Therefore the goal is specifically for the fee necessary to do it, as well as a few other related expenses. Jasper has developed the prototype and is ready to complete the project once his fee has been met. In the unlikely event that he is unable to complete it, he and I have made arrangements for another professional to take it over.

All the rewards are finished and ready for delivery. I budgeted for them prior to the Kickstart.

FAQ

One thing at a time. I did look into it. A lot of those media have odd specs about what you can and can't do for them, and unfortunately it's not very modular either – each one is a sizeable project of its own, and the programmer guys tell me each is also a giant headache. So unless this Kickstart makes an insane amount of money, I have to leave such talk for the future. Maybe I should say that again: "Unless this Kickstart makes insane amounts of money …"

It's a good look at a different way to look at on-line play – not merely dressing it up with bells & whistles, and not merely providing virtual dice, but actually matching the structure of a specific game to the real-live interaction among people. I'm inventing a way for on-line play to gain the virtues of real-life, face-to-face play. It's just a starting step, certainly, but it's a *good* starting step and you might be the person to take the next one, for example for your own game.

The company which casts the figures is just like the printer of the books: it does it POD (print-on-demand) and this time, they already have the files. I never see the figures; I just send the rep all your addresses and wham, they extrude, pack, and mail'em from there. Since you've prepaid postage, I send them one check for the casting and postage all together, and they hit the floor running. Believe me, I loathe the idea of sitting in a sea of minis and bubble-wrap even more than you hate waiting.

That said, the October deadline is for the electronic file. The minis guy says his turnaround from the order date is 20 days.

Both the figurine sculptor and the music composer have a special deal with me, in addition to the initial flat fee I've paid them: out of every $25 pledge for their stuff, they get $5. So in addition to helping S/Lay w/Me, when you pledge for those, you're also directly paying really talented people to do the work they love.

No. The Gallery will become more sophisticated over time no matter what, or at least, insofar as people continue to use it, I'll keep working on it. If the Kickstart provides me with some slush money, that will certainly go into the Gallery inasmuch as it'd go into any current expenses. But I'm not going to pre-dedicate Kickstart funds there in any organized way. The Kickstart's goal is the app, period.